Film review- Nemesis

Starring Billy Murray, Nick Moran, Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott

Directed by James Crow
By@RogerCrow

I love a good British gangster thriller. They are few and far between these days, and while The Long Good Friday, Mona Lisa, and Sexy Beast are glorious memories, it’s about time we had a few new ones.

Which brings us to Nemesis, a slick, polished and at times nasty crime saga, which is just what you want from the genre. Some gangster thrillers are just horror films in another guise, and while there are a few shock moments here, its masterstroke is keeping things tight and twisty, so you’re never quite sure who to trust, if anyone.

With a solid cast, including Billy Murray and Lock Stock’s Nick Moran, the story unfolds with skill, until that rug-pulling third act when things really get going. Bruce Payne, who for me will always be the villain in Passenger 57, gives a brief but stunning turn as Damien, the arch bad guy putting Murray’s crim John Morgan out to pasture.

While Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott gives a brave, at times jaw-dropping performance as the photogenic matriarch Sadie, who will do anything to protect her family. There’s also a memorable turn from Lucy Aarden, though I’ll not explain why. Safe to say she’s got a bright future ahead of her, and not just because her surname will appear at the top of many a casting director’s A to Z list.

Killing Eve fans may spot an influence with one character, while Apocalypse Now aficionados will spot a nod to that classic as Moran’s alcoholic, vengeful Frank Conway tackles his demons. There’s a touch of drama Desperate Hours, and whether intended or not, there’s also a plot twist reminiscent of 2020 Brit crime flick Silent Night (which also starred the brilliant Frank Harper).

One problem I have with some gangster dramas is knowing who to root for if everyone is crooked. And at the end of the day, it’s fascinating that we’ll always side with a family man, no matter how morally bankrupt, over another character. Though just about everyone here is a bit broken, the bottom line is it kept me hooked. And unlike some films which leave me counting the minutes until the end, this made the most of its tight running time.

Personally I’d have cut 50% of the F-bombs (less really is more); added a reference to Chas and Dave during a line about an irritated antagonist, and trimmed a second or two from that final scene, but it hardly matters.

It’s lean, mean, looks terrific, and is hugely entertaining, especially when the pieces of the puzzle slot into place. Kudos to director James Crow (no relation) for juggling the assorted elements, and writers Adam Stephen Kelly and Jonathan Sothcott for the compelling story.

The latter has been propping up the British film industry for years with a string of great indie dramas, and I’d say this is his best offering to date.

8

Film review- The Banishing

Starring Jessica Brown Findlay, Sean Harris and John Lynch

Directed by Christopher Smith

By @RogerCrow

England during the 1930s, and Linus, his wife Marianne and their daughter Adelaide move into town, where he has been posted as the new reverend. He’s been hired by the Church to renew the villagers’ faith, which has been lost after the disappearance of the previous reverend’s family. They lived in the same creepy manor where Linus and his clan have settled into.

Not long after their arrival, weird events start to occur: ghostly voices, shadowy figures dressed as monks, and Adelaide’s behaviour becoming stranger by the day.

While the first act is a feast of production design, amazing wallpaper, great costumes and simmering sexual tension between troubled Linus and Marianne, things soon become a little by the numbers as we start roving round dark corridors with torches.

There are plenty of genre cliches, from the faulty torch in the gloom to a baby crying in the dark. And yes, there are a few jump scares, and moments of creeping dread. But there are also inspired touches, including a fine gag with a mirror.

Jessica Brown Findlay sells the premise brilliantly. In fact all of the cast are great. It’s well constructed, unnerving in all the right places and if you like period dramas with things going bump in the night, then you’ll love it.

Not really my cup of Earl Grey in a bone China cup if you get my meaning, but it does exactly what it needs to for a period haunted house yarn.

7.5

Film review- Assault on Station 33

Starring Sean Patrick Flanery, Michael Jai White, Mark Dacascos

By@RogerCrow

Essentially Die Hard in a hospital, this by-the-numbers thriller also owes a massive debt to 24. Sean Patrick Flanery, looking like a cross between Gordon Ramsay and Kiefer Sutherland, is decorated veteran and PTSD sufferer Jason Hill. He meets his wife, Jennifer, for lunch at the Veteran’s Affairs hospital where she works. After she is called away for an emergency consultation with the head of US Military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, the hospital is taken hostage by armed terrorists. Jason must battle the terrorists and his own PTSD-induced demons to save his wife, the General, the hospital’s staff and patients.

The script sounds like it was written by a computer which analysed dialogue from Die Hard, Aliens, 24, Heat and countless other action films. There are also times it feels like the 24 theme is also going to pop up, and though it helps that most of the cast don’t carry a lot of baggage from other films, they are sold short by the well-worn premise.

Assault on Station “24” might be a better title

Michael Jai White is always good value for money, and here he adds gravitas to the project. Flanery, looking light years away from the excellent Young Indiana Jones TV series, gives a good turn as the lone hero with the dodgy knee, and the whole thing ticks over with plenty of energy. Helmer Christopher Ray has given us a string of schlock horror thrillers like Two-Headed Shark Attack, and sci-fi yarn Asteroid vs Earth, so he knows how to knock out a relatively cheap D-List thriller. It’s a shame the script is so generic, but given half the chance, I’d love to remake Die Hard too. (But definitely not Die Hard 2).

Nicolas Cage’s son Weston Cage Coppola does a good job as the alpha bad guy with a thick Russian accent. He’s picked up his dad’s gift for playing mad staring psychopaths, though here he looks more like Jason Momoa; subtitles would have helped enormously. There are some good action scenes, but there’s also far too much talking and so-so characters. The fact it’s bookended with the same showdown at an airport feels a) really cheap and b) a little too much like Die Hard 4.0. If you have 90 minutes to kill, then slip your brain into neutral and enjoy, but those expecting a fresh twist on a very familiar story will be sorely disappointed.

6.5

Film review – The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Starring Roger Moore, Barbara Bach, Curt Jurgens
Directed by Lewis Gilbert
Certificate PG
By @RogerCrow

If there was a potential motto for Roger Moore’s third outing as 007, it was “Go big or go home”.
As good as the first two Moore Bond offerings were, those epic battles involving dozens of troops were notably absent. All that would change with “Spy”.
Very loosely based on the Ian Fleming novel, this is a remake of sorts of You Only Live Twice, with arch villain Stromberg (Curt Jurgens) snaffling ships, subs and no doubt all manner of fish for his nefarious plans.
But we open with the mother of all Bond stunts. Having bedded another blonde lovely (Sue Vanner), James sets off from his luxurious cabin on skis in his bright yellow suit. As enemies close in for the kill, 007’s lethal ski pole ends one assassin’s career. With Marvin Hamlisch’s killer track Bond 77, the Bee Gees-inspired tune is pure disco. While the ski stunts are great, that phenomenal jump off the edge of a cliff is cinema gold. No score. No slide whistles. Just silence, until Bond’s Union Jack ’chute opens and the crowd goes wild. And as if that weren’t great enough, Carly Simon’s vocals kick in with THAT title track.

What follows is an overlong but epic mix of comedy, action, suspense and globe-hopping. Barbara Bach looks phenomenal as Major Anya, the Russian agent investigating the death of a loved one. Yes, that guy killed by a bullet-firing ski pole in the pre-credits scene. (Sadly for me, Barbara is more wooden than a Trojan horse, but it hardly matters).
With steel-toothed giant killer Jaws (Richard Kiel) adding plenty of menace, there are scenes of sheer terror as Bond picks up a breadcrumb trail of clues in Egypt. (Listen out for series veteran Charles Gray on the pyramids narration).

Caroline Munro is wonderful as a lethal, sexy helicopter pilot, and much missed Canadian Shane Rimmer does a lot of the heavy lifting as allied forces leader Commander Carter.
One person who doesn’t do much is Curt Jurgens’ Stromberg. A case of maximum threat, minimum effort, as he bumps off anyone he doesn’t agree with.
One of the stars of the show is Ken Adam’s phenomenal submarine set, built at the specially constructed 007 stage. Little wonder so much action is set there in the third act as explosions, gunfire and stuntmen fill the frames.

There might not be much to the story, but blimey it still looks great after all these years. And while newcomers will wonder why so much attention is paid to Bond’s waterbike, back in 1977 it was one of the greatest things viewers had ever seen.
Edited by (future 007 director) John Glen and lensed by Claude Renoir (one of his final films as cinematographer due to ailing eyesight), this is splendid stuff. And then there’s that Lotus chase. Though the Aston Martin DB5 remains the greatest Bond car, the submersible Lotus is a close second, and still looks wonderful today.

TSWLM set the bar so high for blockbusters, it’s little wonder many had such a hard time matching it. It’s far from perfect, but compared to some of the early eighties Bonds, it’s an absolute masterpiece.
Kudos to the cast and crew. When it came to must-see spy capers, nobody did it better.

Cast 8
Effects 8
Score 7.5
Title track 9.5
Editing 8

Film review – Moonraker (1979)

Moonraker (1979)
Starring Roger Moore, Lois Chiles, Michael Lonsdale
Directed by Lewis Gilbert
Certificate PG
By @RogerCrow

Many James Bond fans will laugh at the thought of Moonraker being the best of the saga. They might say it’s got little to do with Ian Fleming’s novel, or it ignores the idea of Bond completely. That’s fine; each to their own. But made after the first Star Wars, it was inevitable that Eon productions would attempt to cash in on its success with a space adventure. After all, 007 usually jumped on any bandwagon during the seventies, whether it was blaxploitation or Kung Fu.
So the thought of Cubby Broccoli doing anything but a sci-fi influenced Bond in 1979 was unlikely.
And what a movie. That perfect mix of travelogue, spy capers, danger, and death-defying stunts is like a balanced meal. The starter involving a terrific mid-air space shuttle hijack followed by 007’s own free-fall mid-air parachute hijack gets things going nicely, and at a mere six minutes is just the right length. Great Maurice Binder opening titles; terrific Shirley Bassey vocals, and the usual exposition and gadget delivery in one go.

This was the last Bond of the seventies and Bernard Lee’s final performance as M, so it’s rather poignant.
The main course is a feast of thrills and spills as Bond tracks down industrialist Hugo Drax at his chateau in the ’States’ (though it’s obviously France).
Michael Lonsdale gives a note-perfect performance as the bad guy. He’s sinister, dry-witted, a touch scathing, and he actually does stuff, unlike predecessor Stromberg who mopes around his watery lair. Drax did get a hand-me-down henchman in the form of Jaws (Richard Kiel), who, after being the terrifying, steel-toothed killer of The Spy Who Loved Me, is now a comic foil. Watch him try to fly when his parachute doesn’t open. Hilarious? Well, when you’re 11, yes.
And here’s my theory. If you’re a Bond fan, a 007 offering you see around that age will stick with you a lifetime. It’s like a footprint in the wet cement of your mind. That impression is hard to avoid as you get older.

Jaws also gets a girlfriend, in the form of diminutive Dolly (Blanche Ravalec). The beauty and the beast thing is obvious, and utterly nuts, but strangely works. (All Jaws needed was the love of a good woman, and suddenly that desire to kill went out the window. Ah how I bet he regrets biting folks in the neck now).
Bond’s exploits at the Iguassu Falls on the Argentine/Brazilian border remain one of my favourite set pieces, partly because I was lucky enough to visit there in 2002, but mainly because it’s the scene where I first started watching the movie. This was back in the days when you could walk in half way through a film; watch half and stay for the next performance without being kicked out.

John Barry’s score is easily one of his best, from the Samba-inflected version of the main theme to the dreamy ’Bond Lured to Pyramid’, and phenomenal later stuff in space.
Though the sacrificial pawn, Corinne Dufour (Corinne Clery) is stunning but a tad weak, at least the heroine, Holly Goodhead makes up for it. Lois Chiles (who was cast after sitting next to the director on a plane) is that perfect mix of glamour and grit, as was Jill St John in Diamonds Are Forever.

With some gloriously over-the-top set pieces in Venice, including that gadget-laden gondola and a double-taking pigeon, Moonraker never takes itself too seriously. There’s even a Sergio Leone homage with Bond as a gaucho.
Drax’s plan to take over the world by killing all the people and repopulating it from his orbiting “stud farm” is monumentally sinister. In fact it’s probably one of the darkest, and most ambitious plans of all the 007 villains, but obviously one man attempts to stop him.
The ’dessert course’ in my tortured analogy begins as Bond and Goodhead manage to steal one of a Drax’s shuttles and blast off to his secret space station.

Derek Meddings’ model work and effects are out of this world, and were achieved by a painstaking process of exposing separate elements to the same strip of film. By the time they were complete, that celluloid was almost at breaking point, but melded with Barry’s Flight Into Space, they remain one of my favourite scenes in any movie.
One shot of a shuttle emerging from shadow after the line “Let’s try docking,” is phenomenal.
As this was production designer Ken Adam’s final Bond movie, he also went out on a high with some outstanding sets, including Drax’s mission control, and that space station interior, which takes my breath away every time I see it.

While the mix of Barry, Meddings, Adam and director Lewis Gilbert is superb, it’s obviously Roger Moore that keeps things grounded where needs be. This was his 007 at the height of his powers, charismatic as ever, and a terrific leading man. Obviously he made three more Bond offerings after this, but I wished he’d gone out on this all-time high.
It even features one of the franchise’s greatest double entendres, courtesy of Q (Desmond Llewelyn) in the final minutes. “I think he’s attempting re-entry sir”. You’d never guess screenwriter Christopher Wood previously worked on the ’Confessions’ films. Or maybe you would.

The seventies gave us some of the best loved and most outrageous Bond epics in the series. And five of them! How lucky we were. So no prizes for guessing which is my favourite, even though you’ll probably disagree. As a side note, this was the most lucrative of all the Bond films until GoldenEye in 1995, so I’m guessing a few others liked it too.
Like 007’s diamonds that started the decade, Moonraker is forever. Yes, even with that double-taking pigeon.

Cast 8
Screenplay 8.5
Effects 9
Score 9.5
Editing 9
Rewatchability 9.5

Film review – Octopussy (1983)

Starring Roger Moore, Maud Adams, Louis Jourdan
Directed by John Glen
By @RogerCrow

British agent 009 does not fare well in the 13th official James Bond movie. Unlucky for some? Well definitely for this 007 fan. Released within months of unofficial Bond offering Never Say Never Again, which saw a bewigged Sean Connery return to the role of MI6’s much loved agent, that Thunderball remake and Roger Moore’s offering were as humdrum as one another. However, there is a good pre-credits sequence here involving Bond and a mini plane dodging missiles. (The summer of 1983 saw Superman doing the same thing in his third outing, so at times it feels like the same movie).

The opening theme isn’t bad. John Barry back on composing duties, with Rita Coolidge on vocals and Tim Rice lending a hand with lyrics.
But back to 009, who comes to a sticky end while trying to escape from East to West Berlin. He dies in the residence of the British Ambassador, dressed as a circus clown and carrying a fake Fabergé egg.
Could the Soviets be responsible? Well, at the time the Cold War was still very much a thing, so possibly.

When the real egg appears at an auction in London, James Bond attempts to identify the seller.
Exiled Afghan prince Kamal Khan winds up paying £500,000 for the fake egg, and Bond follows Khan back to his palace in Rajasthan.
The India locations look glorious. Naturally this is travelogue India, so it’s bursting with colour and vibrancy while 007 runs around tackling bad guys with his contact, Vijay. This bit always confused me, as it’s tennis player Vijay Armitraj playing a character called Vijay, who’s rather good at tennis. So there’s lots of tennis gags, and yet it’s not really him. Which is odd, because (spoiler alert) he winds up dead via that most impractical of weapons, a circular saw yo-yo. (At least ’the real’ Vijay had more credibility as a doomed Officer in Star Trek IV a few years later).

Eventually Bond heads to a floating palace in Udaipur, and finds its wealthy owner, Octopussy, a smuggler and associate of Khan.
Maud Adams, from 1974’s The Man with the Golden Gun, returns as the eponymous femme fatale, though she’s sold short by a dull script and seems to sleepwalk thought the movie. In fact the bulk of the film seems so by-the-numbers I’m glad I spent part of it watching on the treadmill otherwise I may have nodded off.

Louis Jourdan has a good time as the bad guy, and Steven Berkoff chews the scenery as a mad Russian.
There’s a throwback to Pussy Galore’s Flying Circus, only this one is obviously Octopussy’s and is set on a train. Like Trading Places, released around the same time, there’s also a scene involving a fake gorilla. Which is great in a knockabout comedy, but never in a Bond movie.
There was a real sense that the 007 franchise had lost its way by the early 1980s. With Bond films being turned out every two years, the stories were a bit dull, the scripts so-so, and as terrific as Roger Moore is, it was obvious another man should have stepped into the role. And at one point it looked like James Brolin would be that man, as we see in the Blu-ray extras. But he definitely wasn’t right for the part, despite lavish screen tests, so Mr Moore was rolled out for his penultimate turn as Bond.

For your thighs only

Director John Glen does his best with the material, but the third act with 007 dressed as a clown trying to stop a bomb going off in a circus is just dreadful. The summer of 1983 was dominated by Return of the Jedi (which also featured now much missed 007 veteran Jeremy Bulloch), and though any Bond film was an event, it just couldn’t compete with that effects-laden blockbuster. So James clowning around felt completely at odds with the era. It was more Benny Hill than Bond, and even the finale on a plane couldn’t salvage things. The fact I couldn’t name a single standout John Barry track says a lot about the score, which at one point sounds like the generic Bond theme had just been used as a temp track and kept in.

Moore the merrier

So there’s plenty of glamour, and comic relief from a fragile-looking Q (Desmond Llewelyn), but like For Your Eyes Only, this is far from the ’All Time High’ that the main theme suggests.
Though it looks fabulous in its restored HD version, just a shame the same tech that cleans up movies couldn’t have spruced up some of the dialogue.
Roger Moore had one Bond film left in him before he called it a day, and at least that was slightly better. ’From A View to a Kill’, as the closing titles suggest, would be slightly altered when it was released in 1985. But that’s another story.

Cast 7
Script 5
Score 6.5
Direction 6
Editing 6
Rewatchability 3

Food review- The Devonshire Arms’ Duchess’s Choice Recipe Box

The Devonshire Arms’ Duchess’s Choice Recipe Box
By @RogerCrow

A few years ago I enjoyed one of my favourite meals during an On Yorkshire review of The Devonshire Arms; I was knocked out by the phenomenal surroundings, great food and excellent service. A return trip has been long overdue, but you know what put paid to that idea. So when I heard they were doing gourmet recipe boxes and would I like to review, I didn’t need to think twice.
A well-packed, chilled box arrived one Friday lunchtime, and there’s plenty of goodies to tuck into.

The ham hock starter takes five minutes to prepare, if that. Just snip the relevant bag; pop the pea salad, the goat’s curd and the ham hock terrine in a bowl; mix together, add the apple gel and tuck in. It’s terrifically tasty, and takes me back to that glorious afternoon a few years ago when we soaked up the landscapes while enjoying the amazing food. Freshness is such an over-used term in marketing, but this really ticks that box. Obviously you can have the starter, the main and dessert in one sitting, but I have the starter on the Friday night, and it’s wonderfully filling.

By Saturday lunchtime I’m ready for my main, and like the starter it’s really easy to prepare. Pop the oven on; place the roast potatoes, cauliflower covered in cheese, and hunk of spring lamb on a baking tray. I have the worst oven in the world, so half an hour was fine; yours may be faster.
Ten minutes before the end, boil a saucepan of water and pop your bags of seasonal veg and gravy in.
Obviously tastes vary, so cook your lamb for longer depending on preference. When ready, just snip the relevant bags, pour or empty and serve with mint jelly.
The taste is phenomenal, and obviously restaurant-level quality. Fluffy roasties, tender lamb, and moreish cauliflower cheese with amazing gravy and delicious veg. I’m not an accomplished cook, but in half an hour I had a superb meal which looks like it took ages to prepare. Obviously all of the hard work has been done for you, so you just cook, serve and enjoy. If you’re trying to impress someone special in your life, just hide the boxes and they’ll think you’re some kind of culinary genius.

There’s a lot of food, so you’ll not go hungry.
By Sunday, having scoffed the leftovers (still amazingly tasty), it was time for dessert, and the sticky ginger sponge pudding may have only taken minutes to prepare, but again was a treat for the tastebuds. Just follow the instructions card; zap in the microwave with the ginger syrup; add the coconut and lime cream, and if ’burnt pineapple’ is your thing, zap that for a few seconds and enjoy. The taste is sensational with the sponge perfectly balanced by the cool cream and sweet pineapple; it rounds off a genuinely perfect meal.
Whether you have the whole lot in one sitting or like me prefer to savour every mouthful over a few days, I’d highly recommend it. And if you’re a vegan, the Devonshire Arms also do recipe boxes which should be right up your street.
Super easy, amazingly tasty and great value. I’m not surprised the Duchess of Devonshire gave her seal of approval.
Thanks Dev Arms. Lockdown suddenly got a lot tastier.

Film review- For Your Eyes Only (1981)

Starring Roger Moore, Carole Bouquet, Topol
Directed by John Glen
Certificate PG

It was the summer of 1981 and I couldn’t wait for the next 007 movie. I’d bought the Marvel Comics adaptation from my local newsagent, and could only imagine how exciting the new film would be. After all, Moonraker had been the best Bond so far, and the next one had to be even better, right?
Well, not quite.
When I went to see it one Thursday night with my folks, it was a major letdown.
We open with a nice throwback to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and Bond visiting the grave of his dear departed Tracy. After being picked up by helicopter (piloted by Citizen Smith’s George Sweeney), 007 is soon in danger once more when the pilot is killed and he is left to try and keep the chopper airborne. Two interesting bits of trivia. The action takes place over the same area that would become the Millennium Dome, as used in 1999’s The World is Not Enough, and John Hollis plays Blofeld (voiced by series regular Robert Rietti). Hollis helped prop up a string of blockbusters, including the early Superman films, and was also Lando’s aide in The Empire Strikes Back.
While wheelchair-bound Blofeld operates the chopper via remote control, Bond gets wise to his scheme, hooks him onto the helicopter skid and drops him down a chimney.
But not before Blofeld utters that line. “Mr Bond! We can do a deal! I’ll buy you a delicatessen! In stainless steel!”
Yes, the ravings of a madman. If only anything that followed were as bizarre.

Cue the opening titles, and a year after finding fame on Esther Rantzen’s TV show The Big Time, Sheena Easton not only belts out the slightly wishy washy title theme, but also appears in the credits, a first for a vocalist in the franchise.
What follows ranks as one of the dullest entries in the series as a bunch of humdrum characters pootle about while chasing after the Atac device, a McGuffin so dull, it looks like it was knocked up on Blue Peter.
It’s a gizmo used by the Ministry of Defence to communicate and co-ordinate the Royal Navy’s fleet of Polaris submarines. (Whether Emily Atack has a similar gift is doubtful, but she would be a terrific addition to the next movie).
Carole Bouquet is stunning as the heroine Melina, seeking vengeance for the death of her parents. Naturally she crosses paths with Bond and they stage a daring escape from a killer’s goons… in a Citroen 2CV. Okay, nice to do something a bit different rather than using yet another super car, but Bill Conti’s theme leaves a lot to be desired. In fact the whole movie feels like a James Bond knock-off that just happens to star Roger Moore.
There’s a sub-plot involving Lynn Holly Johnson’s besotted ice skater Bibi; Topol’s nut-chomping shady character Columbo, and Julian Glover also pops up, looking like he’d rather be on the set of The Empire Strikes Back. Charles Dance makes an early appearance as a henchman, and Pierce Brosnan’s former partner Cassandra Harris adds glamour as a sacrificial pawn.
Bond clashes with a generic killer (Michael Gothard), who he then pushes off a cliff. Roger Moore apparently had problems with the morality of this scene, though I’m guessing the opener when Bond drops a disabled psychopath into a chimney was fine.
There’s an underwater scene which looks nice, but lacks the energy of the Thunderball set pieces, and to paraphrase former villain Drax, things proceed with the tedious inevitability of an unloved season.
As stunning as she is Ms Bouquet and Moore share zero chemistry, and while there’s a great ski chase (care of Willy Bognor), even the finale involving Bond making a death-defying ascent up a cliff feels a bit yawnsome. There is one great stunt, and a compelling piece of shoelace-related ingenuity, but that’s about it.

And just when you think things can’t get any worse, there’s a mis-judged finale involving Janet Brown’s Margaret Thatcher and a parrot (owned by OHMSS star Diana Rigg). Thankfully John Wells’ Dennis Thatcher is rather amusing.
Without John Barry’s score, Ken Adam’s set or direction by the likes of Lewis Gilbert or Guy Hamilton, Bond 12 is a mess.
Richard Maibaum and Michael G Wilson’s screenplay is decidedly average, and the whole thing feels like the producers got a package deal to Greece and did everything on the cheap.
On the plus side, the remastered version looks terrific in HD, and… that’s about it.
Had every copy been dropped into Blofeld’s chimney, it would not be the worst thing in the world. (For a film centred on submarines, its apt that this is so sub-standard).
Sadly, things didn’t get much better a couple of years later, but that’s another review for another time.

Cast 7.5
Screenplay 5
Direction 6
Score 3
Editing 7
Title song 3
Rewatchability 2